Huge Success For Campaigners As Rage Against Maximus Explodes Onto The Streets Across The UK

Over 30 towns and cities held protests yesterday against the involvement of sinister US based outsourcing company Maximus in the despised Work Capability Assessments.

Maximus take over from Atos this week carrying out the tests used to strip benefits from sick and disabled people by finding them ‘fit for work’. Atos were chased out of their lucrative contract with the DWP after a string of protests destroyed their carefully crafted corporate identity and campaigners have vowed to do the same to Maximus.

In London up to a hundred disabled people and supporters descended on their non-descript London offices where a noisy and determined protest took place outside their front door. Protesters then took to the streets and occupied a roundabout where a Work Capability Assessment circus was held with events including a jumping through hoops display and a box lifting competition – a reference to one of the criteria in the assessments used to find people fit for work. The circus ended with a rousing chorus of David Cameron Is A Wanker from the Kilburn Unemployed Workker’s Group.

Protesters then marched towards Parliament Square, stopping briefly outside the locked down and fenced off Department of Work and Pensions before blocking the busy Victoria Street. Whilst a low key police presence looked on protesters held the road for almost an hour, bringing traffic to a standstill.

The hashtag for the day #maximarse also briefly trended on twitter as thousands of people vented their outrage about the company online. This proved so popular that a panicking Maximus quickly bought the domain name marximarse.com as spotted by @refuted.

The day was a huge success for campaigners and showed that simply changing the bastards carrying out these assessments has done nothing to dampen the rage against these nasty and vindictive tests. Yesterday was just the start. The best thing Maximus could do now is cut their losses and scuttle off back under a rock because all this contract is going to do is cost them lots and lots of money.

Reblogged this on Blinded by the Darkness and commented:
Plymouth had about ten people protesting … they aren’t very good at PR and I’m not filming them any more after Unison accused me of trying to steal their camera!

An excellent day in London – am working on the images I made and they will be on my blog soon.

With reference to Maximus buying maximarse.com – it appears they have been on a shopping spree as .org etc have also been bought. It is almost as if they are being advised as to tactics by someone who used to campaign;-)

Do you think you are making things better Sue? I heard that there were going to be no changes to the WCA, and Lichfield has pretty much recommended this too in his latest report. With no changes, what can we hope for? A cup of tea before execution? Comfy scatter cushions? Personally I don’t blame you for trying, but didn’t everyone agree it needs scrapping not tinkering with? It was the WCA, not ATOS that was Judged by Professor Harrington to be ‘inhumane and mechanistic.’ Changing the company running the Assessments, may mean they are carried out more professionaly but the staff as ATOS being poorly qualified, rude and a bit useless, was really more of a side issue anyway.

I couldn’t give a fuck about you lead-swingers any more. I’m on £75,000 a year for three and a half years, am voting Conservative in May (hoping to keep Iain Duncan Smith and Lord David Freud in the DWP for another five years, and hoping that the upper rate of tax will end up being slashed as much a you lazy bastard’s welfare payments.

Same WCA, same corporate pimping off the state. Better wall paper and faux smiles and a new logo ain’t going to change the same test, the same software, the same computers, the same desks, the same offices, and mostly the same staff, and the same OUTCOMES.

Motives? Why should I bother to try & discern your motives? I’d hate to be so bloody desperate (about life) that I’d sell the disabled and vulnerable down the swany river. And personally I’d never work for any company that has been sued for fraud and incompetence while milking the systems for money intended to go to the vulnerable across three continents. No polish will put a shine on that turd.

“Working to improve the WCA” is rather like hearing Miss World wanting to work for world peace. Yeah.

They might change the heading on the letter paper so it reads Maximus instead of Atos. Maybe rename their HQ Maximus House instead of Atos House. Oh and I think the Nazis are paying them 2 or 3 times more than they were paying Atos so expect assembly line style Fit for work assessments with map to the job centre at the end of it. Though I’ve head that they will find you fit for work before going through the motions of the fake assessment. But shore wasn’t that what Atos did also don’t you know?

The bloody do gooders have helped the Government do this, by insisting we be called disabled they have demeaned and downgraded us, you can disabled a car by clamping it, you can disabled a watch torch and many things by taking out the battery but guess what you can re-enable all of them by putting them back together. You cannot re-enable me I am a cripple and I will be a cripple for the rest of my life

But MAXIMARSE doesn’t have any corporate identity to sully… its already proven to fuck over people and its paymasters fraudulently in many countries, UK, Australia, UAE, et. al.

It was the only company rotten enough and disreputable enough to put in a bid to run the WCA which is why its earning so much more than Atos. IDS specifically chose them to bid, because you can’t tarnish shit.

If you are a rouge company with no morals, no ethics, and no reputation in other areas that might be affected by doing a shit job of WCA and who routinely fraudulently claim money then what have they got to lose by doing IDS’s dirty work… especially when they probably have already factored in an “oh shit we got found out and have to pay some back” percentage into the business plan.

Atos only quit because it had other business interests that were being affected by its WCA work, MAXIMUS have gone into this contract in full knowledge that it doesn’t give a fuck, will never give a fuck, and expects to get paid handsomely for fucking people over.

Thanks for letting us know about the Demo and how it went. The Media are a bit rubbish at reporting this sort of stuff. Sadly I could only be there in spirit. Reckon it we were all as fit as the WCA finds us, there would have been a massive turn out that really could not be ignored. Well done to those who did turn out. You may have been few, compared to how many would have liked to be, there but stopping traffic and being noticed is GREAT!

My friend said they handed him his fit for work statement with a map to the job centre BEFORE they did the fake assessment. Said they said it would speed the process up as they had a lot of sick people to send to the job centre that day. When asked what qualifications the “assessor” had my friend was told the assessor gained a lot of his experience from his recent 3-day visit to Lourdes!

Government fitness for work test is making disabled people sicker, report claims

The Independent – 3rd March 2015

The government test to prove that disabled and sick people are unable to work is causing an increase in physical pain, worsening their condition or delaying their recovery, according to a new survey.

Leonard Cheshire, a charity that works with disabled people, surveyed 350 individuals who had been through the workplace capability assessment, which is used to establish whether benefit claimants are well enough to return to work.

More than six in 10 (65 per cent) of those who had gone through the process said they had ended up with more pain afterwards. Almost three quarters (72 per cent) said they found the assessment had a negative impact on their mental or physical health, or both. The same number described the face to face appointment as stressful.

I’m kinda at a loss here to see just what the Daily Record is complaining about…..After all. that was one newspaper, if we could call it that, who flogged the “No” vote in September ruthlessly. We warned anyone who cared to listen worse was to come from Westminster. Alas, with the help of rags like the Record setting up Gordon Brown as some kind of superhero, not enough ppl took heed of our warnings.
No doubt, the Record is still very proud of itself. It might not be once Labour is nearly wiped out in Scotland. Labour could have and should have destroyed the present tory-Lib Regime ages ago.
But have been so utterly useless, so in love with so many tory social security polices, where it comes up with worse ones of its own, they let these evil satanists in power away with almost everything!
Wonder what the Daily Record thinks of the Labouor MP calling for a tory – Labour alliance at Westminster ?
We all hope of course that the tories don’t get to do any of this after May, and Labour are forced to become a bit civilized as well, like they used to be !

Maximus, Inc. (NYSE:MMS), Andrekovich Mark, Chief of Human Capital of Maximus Inc, unloaded 3,185 shares at an average price of $60 on February 26, 2015. The total amount of the transaction was worth $191,100, according to the disclosed information with the Securities and Exchange Commission in a Form 4 filing. Andrekovich Mark now owns 22,542 shares of Maximus Inc.

A mother with leukaemia. A five-year old daughter so disabled she can’t even throw an arm around the shoulders of someone carrying her up the stairs to her flat. Over two years on the housing register and no chance of even being shortlisted for a property. This is the reality of being disabled and living in housing completely inadequate for your needs.

Her blog has been hijacked by spam posts eg “My name is x, and I want to tell you about the great things which happened in my life since I sent money to a complete stranger (who specialises in, amongst other things “any sickness”).

2 MARCH, 2015
New DWP guidance on updated advice to healthcare professionals
developed separately from Upper Tribunal decision on what evidence
of work-related activity is required for Substantial risk to health
arising from being found capable of work-related activity

Please can you give a copy of the said DWP guidance on updated
advice to HCP on what evidence of work-related activity is required
for Substantial risk to health arising from being found capable of
work-related activity

QUESTION;
Will people be able to ask, and be allowed to have their assessments with Maximus
recorded? On 1/2/12 Chris Grayling said “Anyone that wishes their assessment
recorded may do so.” Or words to that effect.
Have Maximus been given any additional money in their contract to buy duel CD
recording machines and if so how much?

ANSWER;
Yes, individuals are able to request that their assessments recorded but must make the
request at least 48 hours in advance.

The contract with Maximus provides for dual recording of assessments (audio tape or
CD) however, contract costs are agreed commercially in confidence and are therefore
not disclosed and are exempt from release under Section 43 of the Freedom of
Information Act.

well what are we suposed to do about this farce the goverment have decided to carry out the WCA’s ? we cant kick maxfarcemas out as the next party who get in will find another provider and we will be in the same boat again.

ATOS, Capital, Maximus e.t.c no matter what company is chosen these or others our answers will always be changed by the DWP, bring witnesses and have the assessment recorded to stand any chance at all.

Reblogged this on Beastrabban’s Weblog and commented:
This is great, inspiring news from Johnny Void. He describes here the protests against Maximus up and down Britain, including the Circus held in London to demonstrate some of the stupid and demeaning physical tests claimants have been put through. And as the article shows, the outrage even went global, with solidarity demonstration against them in Toronto. And you can tell just how rattled Maximus are as, according to the good Mr Void, they bought the domain name Maximarse.com after being bombarded with comments on Twitter.

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